Yoga Happens Every Day…No Matter What

Tag Archives: quiet

Today I turn 43;This body has made43 trips around the sun,and it seems significantthat I find myself aloneto send up rockets of appreciationfrom my square foot of earthto celebrate the occasion of my birth.I like myself.I like the company I keepin the quiet momentswhen there is no one elseto break the silence,when I have the space to listen tothe deep music of what continueswithout human effort,what remains,what humswhen we finally slow downand accept thatenough is enough.

I woke up this morning with a lightness,was able to get so much accomplished…something had shifted,and my mind wasn’t stuck in the same old thoughts.I felt more like myself todaythan I had felt in ages.I took time to take care of my self,celebrated the quietude,seized the chance to tune inand clear my space.Now, freshly showered,clean sheets on my bed,and a warm mug of teasteaming beside me,I look back in gratitude.It was an incredibly ordinary dayby mostly anyone’s standards,but I’m feeling peaceful now.God bless my ordinary life.

Early this morning
I took a deep breath
and I asked my heart
some questions.
Why was I surprised
when the answers
were so sweet, gentle,
and simple
that they pointed me
back home
to the truth
I always knew?
I suppose I had bought in
to the idea that miracles
were these huge displays
of cosmic power and grandeur.
Now I know better.
Now I know
the greatest miracle
is a simple recognition
of the tender heart
of awareness—
quiet,
gentle, sweet—
the heart in all of us.

Finally the house is quiet.
The day’s frantic energy settles
into the stillness of night
and I can sit in peace.
I light a candle,
take my seat.
It feels like I’ve come home.
I wonder who else
in this world
is meditating
in exactly this same moment.
I picture us all sitting,
candles lit,
quiet, breathing,
many of us,
spanning the globe.
When I picture the world
in this way,
I feel hopeful for our future.
It may be a small offering
but it’s one I make every day.
Who knows what fruits
a lifetime of sitting will bear?
I like to imagine
I’m contributing to peace
on this planet.
I like to imagine
that when enough of us
sit and find peace
within ourselves
even for just a minute
even for just a second
we will eventually reach
a critical mass…
and we will see
a global healing take place.
Would you like to join in
this movement
of peacemaking and
light bringing?
Can you afford not to?

I sit down to write
and I thinkI don’t have anything to say.
And this strikes me
as a good thing.
When noise assails us
every day,
every moment of our lives—
silence becomes a rare
and precious gift.
Offering such silence
to oneself—
even rarer.
So, as I look inwards,
if I notice only silence,
I’ll accept this gift,
and sit in this quiet place,
grateful to receive
this moment of
spacious, silent being.

Not knowing what to say,
I watch how unfamiliar the silence has become,
the discomfort that arises
when staring into the void of space.
Whenever I have a minute
I’m playing solitaire on my phone,
as if every bit of time must be taken up
with something.
Enough is enough.
When I see that the silence has grown uncomfortable,
it means I’ve fallen out of relationship with myself.
I put down my phone and just sit.
I take a deep breath.
The love in me was always there,
it just became obscured by cluttered thinking.
May I befriend the silence
and come home to the inner spaciousness.
By embracing my wordlessness,
I tune into a deeper me,
the self beyond words, beyond description.

We went to an amusement park today.
What feels like play to many
seems to suck the soul out of me at times.
I tried to breathe as we waited in lines,
applying the tonglen meditation technique…
breathing in the impatience
for myself and all beings,
breathing out relaxed presence.
Sometimes I was successful,
I’m pretty sure at others I wore a faint scowl
unconsciously…as I dreamed of silence.
It’s a head game being around so many;
The noise and the commotion
remind me of how much I love quiet,
how important solitude is to my wellbeing.
Looking back on the day I see
another opportunity for balance,
dancing that fine line between being with self
and being with others,
giving enough time to each
to keep sanity and connection both within reach.